Found
by lovesdaryl
Summary: Long drawn-out, slow-burn Caryl reunion set between s4 and 5. Will obviously be non-canon AU as soon as s5 starts airing.
1. Carol

Carol

Patient as always, even though her back and shoulders were screaming after three hours of carrying an annoyingly fussy Judith who started mewling and then crying whenever she tried to hand her to Tyreese, Carol waited as he made sure the safety was on before putting down first his gun and then the two packs he had been carrying in addition to his backpack.

"Thank you, Tyreese. I'll take her back in a little while, I just need to rest my shoulders and arms a bit", she said, handing the sleeping child to the taller man as he reached out to take her.

Tyreese looked all around to make sure there were no walkers anywhere in sight and then suggested, "We could sit down and both get some real rest. Sound good?"

"Sounds like heaven", she sighed, rolling her shoulders and turning her head left, right and left again to loosen the knotted muscles in her shoulders and back. Her arms felt as if they were filled with lead. Her feet felt worse after what, judging by the mellow, tangible light and the position of the sun, had been more than half a day of trudging through the woods carrying either her backpack plus the two additional supply bags or her backpack and Judith.

They both sat down and she slipped out of the straps of her backpack, setting it on the ground. Groaning with pleasure, she helped Tyreese unload his backpack as well, then at once opened it and started rummaging through its contents. "Is the formula down at the bottom or in the front compartment?" she asked, only to add, "Found it!" at once.

Taking out the bottle with the whitish powdered milk already measured into it, she pulled the water bottle from its compartment on the side of her backpack. Unscrewing both bottles, she added water to the powder and started out gently swirling the liquid to dissolve the powder before screwing the top back on and shaking it vigorously. When she was done she capped the milk bottle and placed it in the empty bottle holder on the other side of her backpack to allow the liquid to settle.

She turned toward Tyreese and held the water bottle out to him. He gestured for her to drink first. "I'm sorry, but we can't rest long", he said. "There's not many hours of daylight left and we have yet to find a safe place to stay."

A tired nod was all the answer she could muster. As always since they had left the pecan grove and its dreadful, nightmarish memories behind, they had risen at the first hint of dawn, never daring to stay in one place too long lest either the herd that Tyreese had encountered during the meds run with Daryl or any scouts sent out by the crazed Philip Blake catch up with them. Between fleeing from these dangers, constantly looking out for walkers, and taking care of Judith when she woke up during the night, neither of them had slept more than six hours per night despite their exhausting days.

What sleep they did catch was not restful. They both suffered from nightmares that had them waking up in a cold sweat and with screams of anguish dying on their lips.

Tyreese dreamed of the vanguard of the herd closing in on him as the other members of the meds team were escaping into the woods, of sinking to his knees, sobbing, between what was left of the bodies of Karen and David, and of watching helplessly as the Governor destroyed their prison home with his tank.

Carol dreamed of running through a dense forest, the sounds of walkers always close behind, whisper-shouting Sophia's name as she searched for her lost daughter, of a bleeding, unconscious Daryl being half-dragged, half-carried toward Hershel's farm with a bolt hole in his side and a bullet graze on his temple, of Sophia stumbling out of the barn, her skin a mottled gray, her eyes milky and dead, a huge, festering bite wound at the base of her neck, and Rick stepping out, looking back at her coldly, whispering, "Why do you never mention her name?" before raising his ridiculously huge gun to shoot her sweet baby in the head.

They both dreamed about what had happened back at the pecan grove, of the two fresh little graves they had left behind there, next to the one that they had found next to the old house.

Of course each of them knew why the other kept jerking awake after half an hour's worth of fitful sleep at best whenever they found the time and a place to bed down, but neither of them asked and neither told. Everybody had their own nightmares these days, and plenty of them. There was no need to add more.

Judith's crooning noises as she got hungry after her nap woke them both from a light doze. Carol gave the milk bottle to Rick's daughter whom he had wanted to keep safely away from her, softly whispering the introduction of Little Red Riding Hood to the little girl to keep her quiet as she looked up at her with huge eyes, greedily drinking her cold milk.

Tyreese looked on in silence for a few minutes, then said softly: "I'm ever so grateful I found you ... or rather, you found us ... I wouldn't have known what to do with those girls for much longer. Mika was such a sweet darling, but Lizzie ... There was something unsettling about the way she shot that woman before we made it out of the prison."

Carol abruptly raised her head to stare at him. "She shot somebody?" she asked incredulously, her voice getting louder. Judith produced a dissatisfied-sounding noise, but Carol was too shocked to notice. "You never told me!"

"I didn't think you needed to know, and there were so many other things we had to take care of. Also, the woman she shot was a member of the Governor's army, she was armed and aiming at me, ready to pull the trigger. Lizzie saved my life."

Carol looked heartbroken. "How are we to save our children feom becoming so callous? In a world where you cannot trust anyone you meet, how can we keep them from turning into monsters worse than walkers?"

As he had no answer to that, Tyreese just closed his eyes and lowered his head. Rick had been attempting to deal with these issues with regard to Carl when the super flu had hit the prison and the situation with the Governor had escalated. He had taken Carl off any and all duties directly involving walkers or defense. Unfortunately, things had gone south too fast to be able to determine if that course might be a viable solution.

Lifting his head again he looked at Judith in Carol's lap, still sucking contentedly. "He doesn't even know she's alive", he sighed. "And if we never meet up with him or Carl again he will never even know that she survived the attack. He could die thinking his daughter was already dead."

While Carol realized that Tyreese was unaware that she had had a daughter herself, and had no way of knowing anything about the circumstances of Sophia's death, his words still made her cringe from the anguish knifing through her. Even out of those members of their group who had still known Sophia and not just known of her, Daryl of all people had been the only one who seemed to have any grasp of what losing her daughter had done to her. All the others, Rick and Lori included, who had had the incredible good fortune of having their son survive a gunshot injury without "proper" care by a surgeon in a hospital, had more or less ignored her plight once they had moved off the farm.

Seeing Lizzie and Mika among the Woodbury survivors had painfully reminded Carol of her loss, and she had seen an echo of her pain in Daryl's eyes as they stood side by side, watching as the girls and their father got off the old school bus that had brought those who had been unfit to serve in the Governor's army to the prison after the defenses of their town had been razed.

Daryl had surprised her then by mumbling, "We'll take good care a' them girls", kicking the ground with the tip of his right boot and stealing a sideways glance at her before lowering his head to look at the dust he'd kicked up. "'m goin' out, gonna hunt some dinner for all these folks", he added quickly, the tips of his ears turning bright red. Lifting his crossbow up from where it sat on the ground, leaning against his calf, he'd slung it over his shoulder and stalked off.

She had to stop thinking of him. Tyreese had told her that he hadn't seen anybody else make it out of the prison alive. For all she knew, Daryl was dead, or he had been taken prisoner again by survivors of that crazed idiot's gang of murderers, to be tortured to death either right there or at whatever lair they had been holing up in.

She would never see him again. Like her daughter, he was lost to her forever, and losing him hurt almost as badly as losing Sophia had. Daryl had been the one good thing in her life after she'd lost everything else. Oh, Ed she could easily do without, but her little baby girl and any sense of safety had been lost to her with the loss of the farm.

As the barn that had been holding Sophia's walker had burned to the ground, she had wondered if she should even do anything at all to get away from the approaching herd. Of course there would most certainly be pain while she allowed the walkers to get her, but it would pass. They'd all seen clearly that walkers did not experience physical pain and were devoid of emotion. Maybe this would be a better way out than running and hiding all the time, afraid, exposed, malnourished, alone even among a group of people?

He had given her hope that there might be a life worth living beyond that barn, that farm, that herd. Even when she had failed to acknowledge his awkward attempt at consoling her as she had sat in the RV, ignoring him, he had persevered, and when the barn had burned and he'd heard her frightened scream, he had come for her. He had not deserted her like everybody else. He had cared.

And now he was gone. Daryl Dixon, who had survived his father, his own crossbow, two falls down a ravine and a fight to the death in the Woodbury arena, was dead. She felt her throat constricting and angrily wiped her free hand over her eyes, catching the two teardrops making tracks through the dust and sweat caking her face.

Tyreese cleared his throat. "Move on?" he suggested gently.

Looking down at Judith, she saw that the little one had drained her milk bottle. "I'll just change her before we get going again", she said, her hand dipping into the open backpack once more to hunt for a diaper. The big, quiet, kind man beside her nodded and dug out their blanket to spread it on the ground for her.

As she was changing the baby, she looked back and forth between Judith's exposed bottom, the full diaper and their water bottle, almost empty now. "We need to find water", she sighed. "This is our last. If I use this up now to clean her we won't have anything left to drink either for ourselves or for her. If I don't, she ll be sore in no time. What do we do?"

Her pleading look and her tired voice cut him like a knife. Looking around them, he said: "Wait a moment. The ground is sloping that way. Maybe we'll get lucky just this once and it bottoms out nearby. We should find water there."

She gave him a grateful look as he rose, picking up his gun again. "Thank you, Tyreese", she said, smiling up at him. "You're a good man. What would the world come to without men like you?"

Knowing full well that it wasn't just him she was talking about - everybody at the prison had seen how those two had followed each other with their eyes, and how she had dropped everything and gone down to the gate to wordlessly welcome him back and make sure he was okay whenever he came back in from a run, and how it was always her and never Hershel who patched him up when he got hurt - he smiled back at her before silently moving away, following the slope down.


	2. Daryl

Daryl

He still almost couldn't believe that they had made it out of Terminus, and without casualties, no less. The ginger, Abraham, had a bullet graze on his left shoulder that was an inconvenience but not a danger, and Maggie had twisted her ankle jumping out of the boxcar just as all hell had broken loose, but that was about it.

Of course they hadn't taken out the settlement's entire population during their escape but had only killed or incapacitated the guards immediately around them who'd been trying to stop them from getting away. Therefore, it was very likely that they were going to be tracked as soon as the defenses that they'd taken down in their escape had been set up again and the survivors had taken care of their dead. At this last thought, Daryl shuddered, remembering what he'd glimpsed out of the corner of his eyes going in. Thankfully, it had been too dark to make out any details of their surroundings on the way out. Once had been enough.

During their escape, Rick had seen a smirk spread across Daryl's face despite the bullets hitting the asphalt all around them, mainly in an attempt to herd them back into their boxcar without killing them. Surprised, he'd followed the hunter's line of sight with his eyes and had spotted a brawny man wearing a baseball cap hefting Daryl's crossbow atop the roof of the building just opposite boxcar A.

As soon as Abraham had taken the guy out with the gun he'd wrested from the guard they'd overwhelmed when he had tried to hand in their food, Daryl had climbed the rusty fire ladder and had relieved the dead man of his weapon and quiver. The latter still held the bolts he had cut and fletched himself at the prison. Sadly, his brightly patterned poncho was nowhere in sight, and even if any of their assailants had been wearing it, it had probably been too dark to make it out in all the confusion.

Once they'd put a safe distance between Terminus and themselves, Glenn started moaning about losing the pocketwatch that Hershel had presented him with as a token of his acceptance of Glenn courting Maggie. While he would have scoffed disdainfully at this not so long ago, Daryl was now able to grasp the meaning this gift held to both Glenn and his wife, especially in view of losing Hershel so tragically just days ago.

Probably to distract herself from Glenn's whining, Maggie finally fell into step with Daryl who tensed up immediately, knowing what she was going to ask. And of course he was right. Slowing down slightly to increase their distance to Rick, Michonne and Carl who, it seemed, had found their perfect pace as a group unto themselves, but still far enough ahead of Glenn who was now complaining about the stuff that had been taken from them to Sasha and Bob as well as Abraham and his lot, she looked at Daryl expectantly.

He felt her scrutinizing gaze, of course, and it did nothing to relax him. "What?" he barked aggressively when she had been staring at him for a full two minutes without saying a word.

"Beth?" she asked. "Rick said you got out with Beth? That you were together for a few days?" To his dismay he saw her eyes filling with tears and instantly looked back down at his worn boots. The look on her face, in her eyes, made his heart clench.

Haltingly, he began to tell her what had happened at their end of the prison when the shit had hit the fan. He described coming upon Beth after taking out the tank and the dumbass jumping out of it who had stupidly believed Daryl would accept his surrender. Described telling Beth that they had to go, and taking off into the woods.

"Came upon a walker and a group of our people, what was left of 'em. Found Luke's shoe there once we'd disposed of the geek. Wanted to go on, weren't nothin' we could do anyways, but she cried and wouldn't come at first."

"What did you do?" Maggie asked him

"Do? What could I 'ave done?" He was genuinely confused.

Maggie stared at him. "You didn't try to comfort her? You just let her cry?"

He looked down at his feet, shoulders hunched, biting his lip. He finally risked a glance at her through his lanky, sweaty bangs when he tasted blood. "She was sad. Sad people cry, don't they?"

Maggie let out an exasperated sound, then asked: "So, what next? What else happened?"

The going got even more difficult when he told her about the golf club, about beating that walker to a pulp, spraying Beth with blood and brains, and he fumbled for words to describe her reminiscing on Hershel not allowing her to drink alcohol because of the trouble he himself had had with it. The old vet's name brought back the memory of his kind face on that last, fateful day just before the world had gone to hell.

His skin burned with shame as he recalled Carl asking him at the fence, looking at Hershel and Michonne kneeling outside, if he should shoot the Governor. His answer, his decision had cost Hershel and countless others their lives, Maggie and Beth had lost their father, and he had robbed them all of their home. It was all on him, no matter what Rick said.

Expecting disgust and accusations, he hesitantly revealed what had happened at the moonshine shack in the woods - though he kept the details of the game and the resulting shouting match to himself. Never again would he tell that much about himself, his past, his family, to anyone. Telling it all that one time while he'd been drunk and alone and afraid had hurt badly enough, taking him back to all the dark and terrible places in his mind that he'd believed he'd left behind long ago.

Inexperienced as he was in dealing with people and emotions, he didn't recognize the look of longing on Maggie's open face as he casually mentioned little detaills about her sister, such as her habit of stubbornly redoing that little braid of hers every single morning as if it made a goddamn difference how her hair was done up.

The older Greene sister practically gawked at him when he told her that he'd started teaching Beth the skills she would need to survive in this world. Fighting, killing, tracking, hunting, finding edible stuff in the woods - berries, roots, nuts, mushrooms. Killing, skinning and cooking snakes, squirrels, rabbits. Shooting with his crossbow. "You've never taught anyone before - why start now?"

"Won't none of us live forever," he mumbled. "Thought we were the last ones alive. Had to make sure she knows what she has to so she can survive on her own. Couldn't have 'er dependin' on me for shit."

Finally, he told her about the funeral home. Maggie cried when Daryl mentioned the piano, and Beth singing, and Glenn, who had quit bitching a while ago and caught up to them, comforted his wife, putting an arm around her and whispering that they'd find her.

As always when he witnessed scenes like this, Daryl envied them for how easily they could touch and be touched, give and accept consolation, give and accept trust. There was only one person his his own life with whom he'd been able to do all of that, and he had lost her. Again. For good.

Thinking of her made his mind go blank for a moment. He still hadn't grasped the full extent of what her getting banished, her not being near him when the prison fell so he could take her to safety, her having been out there on her own for days by now, really meant.

Reuniting with so many members of his prison family, finding them alive and well, had instilled in him a little hope that she might still be out there, somewhere. But was there any realistic hope of ever seeing her again in this world of monsters both dead and alive? There was no way of searching for her beyond himself physically going out, walking around and looking, on the off chance of finding something to track. Maybe asking for her whenever he met other people who seemed decent enough for him to even mention her. Never would he endanger her by revealing her existence to the likes of Joe and his bunch of murderous, rapist scumbags.

Realizing that Maggie had stopped crying and was waiting for him to continue, he mentally kicked himself, telling himself to get his head out of his ass. He needed to get this over with. After allowing his walls to crumble at that damn moonshine shack with Beth he felt horribly exposed now as he admitted, hesitantly, that Beth had instilled a measure of hope in him that others might have made it out, just like they had, and they might find each other again. Very briefly, for an instant only, he allowed himself to think of Carol again, to remember her face, and his chest ached.

Maggie's grief was palpable as he told her, Glenn and the other members of his prison family who had clustered around the three of them by now, how he had opened the door of the house that night to a group of walkers instead of the dog he expected. "Was all I could do to keep 'em out for a moment, warn her to stay away, but there was too damn many of 'em."

He recounted how he had yelled at Beth to grab her stuff and get out the back door. How he had drawn the walkers finally spilling in down into the basement to give her time. How he had barely made it out alive, only to find her pack on the ground and her whisked away by the car speeding off into the night. How he had run down the street after it all night until he'd collapsed with exhaustion at the crossroads where he'd had no way of telling in which direction the car had gone.

Raw with emotions he couldn't have named, hoarse from talking - he had never talked for such a huge length of time before in his life, ever, let alone to such a crowd - he mumbled an excuse and speeded up. He needed some space, needed to be alone for a bit after reliving all of this so intensely. Unbidden, his mind continued the journey on which he had taken Maggie and he felt deep remorse thinking back to the few days he'd spent with Joe and his group of thugs until they'd caught up with Rick, Michonne and Carl.

He couldn't help but feel that Carol would have been disappointed to see how easily he had fallen in with them, how effortlessly he was able to blend in with them, as if he had never been that man of honor that she saw in him. Believing as he did - until they came upon the candy wrapper that told him who they were following - that he was the only one left alive of their entire group, it had been so easy to give in to his old ways again. Hot with shame, he briefly looked up to get his bearings.

Ahead of them, the trees gave way to a meadow, dotted with bushes and small trees. The ground fell away very slightly, and the experienced tracker in him at once thought of the possibility of water at the bottom of this slope.

They had gotten out of Terminus in the middle of the night with nothing but the clothes on their backs, the weapons they'd taken from their guards, those that Rick had buried before they'd gone in, and his crossbow. They had no additional gear whatsoever, no food, no tools. No containers for taking water along when they found it. Looking up at the sky, he estimated it was about four in the afternoon. They'd been walking nonstop without rest and without eating or drinking.

He stepped up to Rick. Even though the ginger kept babbling about his military training and was constantly trying to wrest control of the group from Rick, he was still their leader. To underline this fact, Daryl spoke softly now so only Rick could hear him, clearly supporting Rick's position by giving his counsel only to him.

"Need ta find water. If it's anywhere, I'd reckon it's down there, maybe a creek, a little lake, whatever. Damn, I'd settle for a puddle as long as it's clean enough ta drink. After that, could put in some huntin', get us dinner."

Rick looked at him, then out at the meadow again. "You're right, it's our best bet. But let's not all go out into the open - it's too exposed, and Maggie's ankle is still troubling her. I'll go, and you cover me. But stay out of sight, I'm not risking anyone here!"

Blushing, Daryl looked down at his boots. Rick knew exactly that Daryl would never stand by and let Rick risk his life. They both knew that, in this one thing, Daryl would never back down. He was loyal to a fault, and he would fight for Rick to the death if it meant saving him. Rick could order him, ask him, beg him even, to keep himself safely hidden until he was blue in the face - Daryl would still step in front of him every time.

"Won't be no protection 'f I stay hidden", Daryl mumbled. "I'll stay back as far as I can, but I ain't gonna let ya go out alone."

Resigned, Rick sighed and nodded his consent. "All right, but at least try not to get kicked this time." He glanced meaningfully at Daryl's bruised face and down at his friend's chest, raising an eyebrow. Daryl guiltily reached up with one hand to what he assumed were two or three cracked or broken ribs. Rick had caught him wincing in pain and rubbing his chest several times and had taken him aside to confront him about it as soon as they'd been out of sight of that blasted train terminus. Daryl managed to keep his thumb from going to his mouth, but he did gnaw on the inside of his cheeck as he nodded reluctantly.

Facing the rest of the group, they told the others that they would go looking for water and wanted them all to stay behind, concealed among the trees. Then Daryl raised his crossbow and the two of them walked right up to the treeline. Careful to make sure that nobody was out there, they looked up and down the meadow, checking if anyone was hiding among the trees on the other side of this valley or clearing or whatever it would turn out to be.

They stepped out into the open.


	3. Found

Found

When he reached the edge of the forest, Tyreese stopped to carefully check if there were any walkers or people moving about out there. With Carol waiting for him back there with Judith, he had to be careful. This wasn't just about him.

He craned his neck, looking first left, then right, before stepping out into the meadow which was drenched with light. His nerves were humming with tension. He was all alone out here, with nobody to watch his back. If he should encounter more than two people at most and they turned out to be hostile, he was done for.

He certainly wouldn't call for help - he couldn't put Carol in more danger than she was already in. If anything happened to him while he was out scouting for their little group, either now or later on, Carol was Judith's last hope. He knew very well what Rick's daughter had represented to everybody at the prison, including the people who had joined from Woodbury.

Quite beyond what a baby being born into the world had meant even before the zombie apocalypse, and in view of Lori's gruesome death during her birth, Judith Grimes stood for a mother's uncompromising devotion to her child, her willingness to die for her child, and for life itself - not just her own or the continuation of her family, but hope for the survival of mankind as a whole. A future. He would not endanger this hope, even if he and Carol were the only ones left alive out of all those who had called the prison their home.

All of this weighed him down as he carefully made his way from bush to tree, seeking shelter whenever possible. The farther he moved away from the edge of the forest, the more exposed he felt. Stepping out of the shadows he was hiding in became progressively harder every time he had to move from one bush to the next across open space.

His breath caught in his throat when he heard a soft noise some distance away. His heart missed a beat and then sped up, doing double time. He suddenly felt his pulse in his temples and wrists, and his bowels seemed to turn liquid. He felt like throwing up.

Inching forward, he tried to catch a glimpse of what he was up against. Holding his breath, careful not to make a sound, he raised one hand to push a slender branch out of his face that blocked his forward view.

It was no use. There was nothing to be seen. But he could still hear very faint noises on the other side of a narrow creek running along the bottom of the shallow valley that stretched out to his left and right. The slope on the other side mirrored the one he himself was creeping down. Apparently, the people he kept hearing were moving toward the creek from the other side. If he stayed hidden, if he was quiet enough, maybe they wouldn't notice him.

A hiss, a soft curse.

"Grimes! Step on me one more time and I'll stomp your ass!"

Everything turned black.

It couldn't be.

It was impossible.

Grimes.

And that soft Southern drawl.

It couldn't be.

It was impossible.

Carol.

She needed to know this. She would be beside herself with joy, after all that they'd been through these past few days.

He turned around and crept back up the hill.

.-.

Daryl was furious. Much as he admired Rick for the way he held their group together, kept them all going, got the best out of each of them, he loathed the man whenever they got out together and he needed him to be quiet.

Even though he was doing his level best to be even remotely as stealthy as Daryl, whom he couldn't hear moving at all, Rick felt like an elephant. His feet seemed to effortlessly find every dead twig, every dry leaf, every stone to kick. All that he did hear from Daryl was whispered curses.

When the hunter had threatened him with a bolt in his backside for the third time, Rick turned around, letting go of a slender branch he'd been holding back so it noisily slapped into Daryl's face. "Maybe you should do this alone. I could go back and get the others - seems like we're alone here."

Casting a livid glare at Rick, Daryl swiped the branch out of his face and nodded. "Yeah, do that. I've seen a creek a few yards downhill from here. I'll keep looking out, keep it clear."

"You be careful!" Rick warned him. "We don't have anything to patch you up - nor anyone to do it!"

Daryl glared at Rick again. "Don't you think you're off the hook yet", he growled softly. "We'll need to talk about Carol once we've found a place for the night. This ain't over, and we need ta discuss this in case we find 'er."

Rick stared at him, speechless, his eyes wide with disbelief. "You want me to change my mind? To take her back in? Have you lost your mind? Nobody will want her!"

Looking around wildly, Daryl shushed him. "Could ya shout any louder? Ya want ta draw a few walkers? Grimes, I swear you'll be the death o' me. Listen closely, man. I said once we'd found a place for the night. Not here, not now. Go back, get the others, and BE QUIET!"

Rick looked unconvinced but, mercifully, didn't argue any longer. Crunching a handful of dead leaves under his foot that he had somehow miraculously managed to miss on his way down, he started up the slope again.

Daryl shook his head in exasperation as he followed his friend with his eyes. "More stubborn than a mule", he muttered to himself, adding: "No her, no me." He felt a pang of regret as he thought back to the last time he'd said this, to the same person. Maybe, if he'd fought harder to bring Merle back to the prison with him the first time, helped him become a member of the group, he'd still be alive today.

Mentally kicking himself for getting lost in his own mind yet again, he snarled at himself to get his head out of his ass and peeked through the leaves toward the creek. Still neither walkers nor people. No tank. He shuddered and once more reminded himself to stay focused. Observant.

Slowly he worked his way down toward the creek, looking behind himself now as often as he looked ahead, waiting for the group to catch up with him. He rolled his eyes when he heard the sounds of crunching leaves and breaking twigs approaching. Count on Grimes to announce himself.

Once he could feel Rick breathing down his neck again, he squinted at him over his shoulder in the warm afternoon light. "We should really send out invitations. Everybody and their brother knows we're here anyway, with you throwing up such a racket."

Rick blushed. "You know I'm no good at this stalking thing", he muttered. "Remember, you refused to teach me to hunt because I scare away your game."

"Yeah, ain't like I had any game to begin with", Daryl mumbled absently, already facing forward again and scanning the slope ahead. "Everybody here and accounted for?" he added, eager to get moving again.

"Yes, they've all caught up", Rick confirmed.

With a nod, Daryl raised his free hand and started creeping forward again, his crossbow aimed at the sky. He held his breath as he stepped out into the open, eyes wide, trying to take in everything at once, ears straining for every sound, unconsciously identifying the birds whose chirping and singing he was hearing and marking them as inconspicuous - they were indigenous to this area, none of them out of place, so the singing and chirping probably wasn't covert human communication.

He made a "follow me" gesture and continued toward the next bush when suddenly he noticed movement high up near the treeline on the opposite side of the valley. Whatever it was, it was quite far away and he had to squint against the light, but he thought he could make out a human shape making for the woods.

Dropping to the ground, he wildly gestured for the others to follow suit. "Saw someone running toward the woods", he hissed at Rick. "Stay down, see if he comes out again. I'll cover some ground."

Rick nodded his understanding and signalled for the others to remain flat on the ground as Daryl started crawling forward once more, directly toward the creek. Personally, he doubted that whoever had run from them would show himself again. If he had noticed them and if he was alone, he'd know better than to take on such a large group by himself.

Daryl, on the other hand, didn't dare hope for that much luck. He was highly focused, almost painfully alert, aware of everything that happened around him. The rustling of the dry, late summer grass, the chirping of the crickets, the murmur of the water in the little stream he was approaching, were all deafeningly loud to him. The sun seemed to be hurling blinding spears into his eyes. Rick's loud breathing sounded like thunder in his ears.

He reached a small boulder half buried in the meadow and crouched down behind it, slinging his crossbow over his shoulder and staring up at the spot where he'd seen the man vanish among the trees. He hadn't shown up again yet, but that didn't rule out the possibility that he might not still do so. He had time. All the time in the world. He had been stalking prey for decades. He settled in for the wait.

.-.

She followed Tyreese, bewildered, confused. He'd shown up wild-eyed, out of breath, had picked up Judith without a word and gestured for her to follow him. He hadn't seemed alarmed and she knew he wouldn't take her into danger knowingly, so she'd gotten up, brushed the dirt and leaves off her legs and backside, and followed him toward the meadow.

.-.

He almost didn't believe his eyes. The trees and underbrush started moving in that very same spot, and the man stepped out again. He was too far away and the sun was too low by now, shining almost directly into his eyes, for him to make out his face or even his stature, but he was certain it was the same man. And he started moving toward them again.

.-.

The meadow was beautiful, tall grass dotted with trees and bushes, and the sky seemed to be filled with birds, all of them singing, and the grass seemed alive with chirping crickets and grasshoppers. All her girls, Sophia, Lizzie, Mika, would have loved this. She felt tears welling in her eyes. If only any of them, if only Daryl were here now with her. She was so grateful for Tyreese, she knew that he would do right by her, but her heart ached for her loved ones that she'd lost. She followed him down.

.-.

In disbelief he stared at the second figure emerging from the trees. If it was a large group ... He didn't dare think to the end. He had asked Rick to get them all down here, out in the open, exposed, unprotected. If this turned out to be a large, hostile group ... He felt bile rise in his throat and instantly heard Merle's voice in his head again, goading him.

"Done fucked up good 'gain, li'l brother. Got 'em all down 'here, like lambs to the slaughter. 's all on you again. Ye'll never learn, will ya?"

"Shut the fuck up, Merle!" he mumbled through clenched teeth. "Got no time for ya now. Come bug me again later, when this is over."

.-.

They were halfway down the slope now, and just as Tyreese had hoped, there was a smll stream running down the center of the valley, gleaming in the sun. She could hear the murmur of the water right up to where she was walking. She started to look forward to washing her face, submerging her arms, sticky with sweat and dust, in clear water and feel cool and clean again for the first time in more than a week. Since Rick had thrown her out.

.-.

The two figures - and it was only two, he saw with relief, nobody else had come out of the forest so far - stepped into the light, out of the shadow of the trees. One of them, the taller one, heavily built, most certainly a man, remained dark, the other, smaller, slighter one, maybe a woman, turned lighter - a lighter skin, lighter hair, maybe gray ... His heart stopped.

.-.

The sun felt warm on her skin, the back of her head, as she stepped out of the long shadow of the forest and into the light. She raised her arms as if to touch the sky, laughing out loud. "This is beautiful, Tyreese!"

.-.

"This is beautiful, Tyreese!"

He had to remind himself to breathe. It couldn't be. It was impossible. It had been days.

From far away he heard Rick's voice calling his daughter's name, but he couldn't be bothered to listen.

He rose up to his feet in one fluid motion.

.-.

She froze in fear when she saw someone rise out of the tall grass on the other side of the stream, but to her surprise Tyreese just kept on walking as if he'd expected that. She opened her mouth to call out to him when her eyes caught the crossbow slung over the figure's shoulder. It couldn't be. It was impossible. Surely he had died back at the prison.

.-.

They started to run.

.-.

They met in the center of the stream that had separated them, the water reaching halfway up their calves. At first, they found no words. They just looked at each other in silence, each drinking in the sight of the other.

Daryl, whispering, his voice hoarse. "You're alive."

Carol, tears running down her face. "Nine lives, remember?"

They exchanged watery smiles.

Daryl, fiercely. "I'll never let ya outta my sight again."

Carol, shaking like a leaf. "I thought I'd lost you. I thought they'd killed you."

His trembling hand reached up, his calloused thumb catching the tears running down her cheek as his hand cupped her face. "Found ya." A contented whisper.

Her hand reached up, passing his, lightly brushing across it, and came to rest on his cheek, her thumb rubbing over his scruffy stubble. "You always do."

Across lightyears they could hear the rest of their family gathering along both sides of the stream, looking on.

Tyreese handed Judith over to her father who sank to his knees with her in his arms, Carl embracing them both. From the corner of his eye, Rick saw Glenn and Maggie embracing, and Bob taking Sasha's hand in his, and he felt Michonne step up to him, lightly, tentatively touching his hand.

Overwhelmed at holding Judith in his arms, alive and safe, he couldn't take in all that Tyreese was saying, but from what he did take in, and from what he saw taking place in the creek, he realized that he had lost the battle before it had begun.

As Carol closed her eyes, Daryl pulled her into his arms, her face sinking against his chest, hearing his thundering heartbeat, his head resting on her shoulder.

He would not botch this again. He would not lose any more time. He had been granted a miracle, a second time, and he would not waste it.

He started breathing again after what felt like eons.

"I love you", they said.


End file.
